WonderCon 2014: ‘Lucy’ director Luc Besson on ScarJo, strong heroines

April 19, 2014 | 9:35 p.m.

Luc Besson’s return to full-tilt action filmmaking with “Lucy” revved up the crowd at the Universal presentation at WonderCon on Saturday.

Set for release Aug. 8, “Lucy,” written and directed by Besson, stars Scarlett Johansson as a drug mule who ingests some contraband and finds herself with enhanced abilities, apparently because the chemicals enable her to access more of her brain. (Johansson has been on a professional run lately, with turns in films including the Academy Award-winning “Her,” in which she gave voice to a sentient operating system; April’s “Captain America: The Winter Soldier” and “Under the Skin”; and next month’s indie restaurant movie “Chef,” directed by Jon Favreau).

In Anaheim on Saturday, Besson screened two sequences from “Lucy,” the first of which showed Johansson’s character learning to exploit the powers she’s unlocked by taking advantage of more of her brain capacity. The second showed a crash-heavy car chase through the streets of Paris.

Although the reception of the footage was positive, one fan’s question — asking Besson to answer critics who said the filmmaker hadn’t released anything good recently — made for an awkward moment.

He continued by saying, “People forget that when I did ‘Nikita’ and ‘The Big Blue,’ the critics were very bad. The films have become classics now, but at the time, they were criticized the same way.”

Besson also waved off a suggestion that he reunite with Johansson for a Marvel spinoff film centering on Johansson’s Marvel spy Black Widow.

“I’m scared of spiders,” Besson said.

He did reveal that he’s interested in opposites, which is why he has made so many action films with strong female heroes.

“We always present the man as the strongest guy and the woman in back crying that he’s gone,” Besson said. “I want to show the strongness of women and the weakness of men. If suddenly Terminator starts to cry and says he misses his mom, then I’d be interested.”

John; I am sorry that YOU are tired of seeing strong heroic women. You state that your boredom comes from approximately 10 to 14 years of this theme. However; men have been strong and heroic for the last 84+ years and they will continue to be portraid this way until the end of time. When the day comes that women have surpassed men in this type of storytelling; I may agree that you have some form of a valid point but even then I doubt we will ever agree. Women; in the real world are strong and heroic. Personally; some of the best characters have been strong women both in action stories and life stories. I am very glad to see that our storytellers are finally giving women the credit and in film the roles they have long deserved. I look forward to this film and I hope it holds up to the expectation that the trailer provides.

Concerned Citizen; I agree with your comment about not using the combined ScarJo; not just in the headline but within the entire article. I find it to be lazy on the writer's part and ridiculous in any circumstance. Unfortunately; our society has become extremely lazy and for some very odd reason people seem to enjoy the combining and shorting of celebrities and celebrity couple's names. In the recent past this would have been found unacceptable by the public and even more so by the celebrities themselves. I hope this is a quickly passing phase in society but sadly I fear society will not leave their laziness behind and return to proper language.